Ports and Harbours

Approaching from the west, the first harbour of any importance is Roebuck Bay, where a port has recently been discovered, affording good anchorage and shelter inside the point on the north-west of the Bay. It is described by the Surveyor-General in his report recently published, and a town site has been selected and surveyed in advance of settlement on the west shore of the inlet. Some 70 miles further north is Beagle Bay, which affords good anchorage and shelter in ordinary weather, but is unsafe in the hurricane season. The landing is said to be better than at Roebuck Bay, the soil is good in the vicinity, and there are some fine natural artesian springs within a few miles of the harbour, but its position is too far removed from the chief pasture lands to render it of use to the settlers. Next is the port at Mary Island, far up in the south-east of King's Sound, and opposite to the recently surveyed town site of Derby, where a resident Magistrate is stationed.

The north-west coast is a succession of deep bays and harbours—Secure Harbour, Doubtful Bay, George Water, Hanover Bay, Camden Harbour, &c., &c., but a glance at the chart will show that the approaches to this coast are studded with rocks, shoals, islands, and the rise and fall of the tide being from 37 feet to 40 feet, the currents run from 7 to 20 miles per hour.

On the north-east coast Cambridge Gulf extends for nearly 80 miles inland, and can be navigated as far as the "Gut," where Durack and party landed in 1882. The advantage of this harbour is that the sea outside the gulf is clear of danger to Port Darwin, to the north-east and to Koepang to the west-north-west. The tide rise and fall, according to the Admiralty chart, is 21 feet, spring-tide, so that the currents are not so dangerous as in some of the western harbours, and there are good anchorages, sheltered from all weathers inside the gulf. The east arm has now been explored and is found to extend for many miles inland from Adolphus Island, where the soundings show 7 fathoms water. The Ord River has been traced debouching into this arm, and is supposed to be navigable to a point near Houseroof Hill. A large Government survey party is to be employed this season in the survey of East Kimberley, and will trace the Ord to this point, where a suitable site is to be selected for a town, as it is anticipated that Cambridge Gulf will be the outlet of the Upper Ord and Victoria River District.